The door opened as she spoke and Mwangi appeared with Kamau, their dark faces shining with approval as they pressed Piet’s hands. He put his arms around them both and hugged them fiercely, and they murmured Kikuyu words of gladness and blessing on the young man they had cared for and watched over since his birth. After a few moments Kipchoge joined them, shy but beaming, holding out an offering of two beaded bracelets he had made for Piet and Sarah, hoping that this day would come about. He slid them carefully over their wrists, and then everybody was clapping as Piet kissed her again. Sarah turned to look for Hannah and caught her in an unguarded moment of sheer desolation that made her lead Piet over to his sister, and draw her into their own joy. They stayed up late into the night, talking and laughing and planning, and finally they gathered around the telephone as Sarah called the operator and gave him the number in Ireland.

‘We’ll come out in the new year, darling girl,’ Raphael promised, when she had spoken to her family. ‘Goodnight now, and God bless you both. Hannah and Lottie too. We love you all.’

When they retired to bed Piet and Sarah were left together.

‘I want to make love to you right now,’ he said. ‘To make us really one. But I think you would like to wait, maybe? So I’ll do whatever you choose, because it won’t be long until you are my wife, for all the rest of our lives.’

‘It’s old-fashioned and silly, I know,’ she replied, unable to think why she would need to wait any longer. Her whole body was shot through with currents of desire and excitement. ‘But I think that’s what I would prefer.’

‘Tomorrow we will make our plans,’ he said, touching her blushing cheeks and kissing her. ‘We’ll decide how soon we can get married and so. It must be very soon. You’ll have to think what you’re going to do about your job, because I know it means so much to you. And by the way, there’ll be no more swimming with your boss with no brookies on! Not for my girl.’

It was a night when everyone slept with a sense of peace and sweetness surrounding them, a turning point when the cloud over Langani had lifted at last. Christmas would be a time of joy long overdue. Anthony called from Nairobi and Piet persuaded him to join them at the farm, to celebrate the engagement.

‘Great news, girl,’ he said to Sarah when he arrived. ‘You have a good man and he’s a lucky chap. What are you going to do about your elephants?’